


the bugs and the trees

by wtfmulder



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Disordered Eating, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, triggering content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-14
Updated: 2018-09-14
Packaged: 2019-07-12 05:13:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15988364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wtfmulder/pseuds/wtfmulder
Summary: “You keep…” he touches her thigh, right where his shirt meets her skin, and she winces. “There, Scully. You keep doing that. Like you’re afraid of me or something.”“It’s not about you,” she says hoarsely. “It isn’t.”





	the bugs and the trees

It’s about control, which she’s lost too much of. It’s about seeing results. It’s about knowing every single ingredient she’s introducing to her body down to the last molecule. It’s about having one less thing to worry about. It’s about knowing herself. 

Latest research says this: the optimal diet recommended for peak performance of the human body is high in fat, low in carbohydrates. Just three years before, when she’d been repairing her body of all the damage done to it — the added weight, the chip in her neck, the omnipresent fear that she was being watched — the most popular studies of the time reported the exact opposite. Carbs were couture. It’s hard to follow where money goes, weigh her options, trust the evidence when it changes with every passing year, so she introduces a little of this, takes away a little of that. For breakfast she likes a handful of nuts, eaten in the car on the way to work, and a dash of soy milk in her coffee. Lunch is normally a low-fat yogurt with an added protein; bee pollen is her newest kick, but sometimes she likes oats and a handful of fresh berries. She wishes she had the time to cook more, but she doesn’t, so Lean Cuisine becomes a godsend for dinner. When she has time she’ll grill up a chicken breast, chop it up and toss it with some greens and a little bit of olive oil.

In her suitcase is small leather journal filled with the caloric information of all the foods she’s consumed in a day, which she records with the assistance of a pop diet book she’d picked up from Barnes and Noble. Filling in the numbers relaxes her; they make sense. She’s just awful at sticking to the number she prescribed herself. 

She’s been gaining steadily, her cheeks filling out, her thighs stretching the fabric of her slacks in a way that makes her feel exposed. Watched. General assignment had actually meant more field work for her and Mulder, so that led to eating on the road, and in most of the podunk towns they visited the only salads offered were covered in cheese, dripping with oil, oversalted and served with bread. Now they are off general assignment and back on the X-Files, snatching up cases like they might be taken away again. Always on the road, always in the drive-thru, always shoveling bags of jerky, Lay’s potato chips and sunflower seeds into  gas station trash cans as they fill their up their tank.

She had thought that figuring this thing out with Mulder would help her regain some of her footing, that she would feel more sure of herself, more solid.  It only makes her  _more_  unsure. He’s so  _handsy_ , always finding excuses to touch her whether alone or in public. When his hands fit over her waist, whether he’s simply moving her aside to reach something above her head or helping her find the right position astride his hips, her confidence falters. Lounging naked with him is impossible, but thankfully she can distract him by slipping into his clothing. What she wants — to be smaller, sometimes to the point of being unseen — is at war with what he demands: all of her, all the time. He’s seen so much of her it could make her ill.

They’re laying in his bed, side by side, slick with sweat and out of breath, and she’s yet again taken aback by how much she loves this man, how good he makes her feel when he puts his mind to it. She forgets herself as she laughs with him, throws her head back on the pillow and closes her eyes. Humming. She’s  _humming_ , perfectly content and all fucked out, sated, thankful,  _joyous._ His cheek thunks against her breast and she holds him to her heart, kissing his scalp and smoothing his hair back. He smells good. Mortal and rabid.

Possessively, his hands begin to roam, finding every space on her body that will take him. Her left breast, her hip, cheek, shoulder, rear. She freezes, uncomfortable, but it’s all okay until her eyes meet her reflection in the mirror above his bed.

“Where ya goin’?” Mulder slurs, trying to catch her arm before she slips out of bed. When he lifts his head, she’s already buttoning his dress shirt over her breasts and rolling up the sleeves. “Scully…” He sits up, rubbing the back of his sore neck with a wince. 

“Smells like you,” she murmurs, crawling back into bed. She cradles his head in her palms and turns his face to hers, planting a soft, wet kiss on his swollen mouth. 

“You’re trying to distract me,” he says. Playful, light, but confused. Very very confused. All she wants to do is fall back to bed with him, tangle his furry legs between her own and fall asleep, but he doesn’t budge when she tries to drag him down.

“Mulder.” 

“You keep…” he touches her thigh, right where his shirt meets her skin, and she winces. “There, Scully. You keep doing that. Like you’re afraid of me or something.” 

“It’s not about you,” she says hoarsely. “It isn’t.” 

“No?”

It takes her a minute to think and come up with an answer he deserves. She’s been rejected by him, stood up, occasionally insulted. But in college she’d stored crates of Slim Fast under her dorm room bed, and in high school there were those diet pills that made her stay up all night and caused her to fail a major test.

“No, it isn’t.” 

“I find you…” he gnaws at his cheek and contemplates his words. How badly he wants to touch her, she can see it in how he clenches the bed sheets. “Very attractive. Uh. Stunning…” Antsy and twitching, chewing on a puzzle he has no hope of putting together.  “Jesus, I hope you know that. You do know that, right? After all this time?” She doesn’t answer, and his voice grows panicked. “No? You don’t… holy fuck, Scully. I mean… holy fuck.”

She folds in on herself, shame-faced and bitter, wrapping her arms around her knees and turning her check from him. “It’s not like you ever  _told_ me that,” she spits, and to her dismay her  bottom lip quivers like jello.

“Hey, hey, I didn’t mean to imply — shit.” He throws his legs over the bed and maybe this is his mercy, letting her be alone while she stews and pities herself. This relationship, by all means, should be impossible. They’re above each other’s pay grade.

But then he begins to pace in front of her like he does in the office, stalking about the room with long, determined strides, convinced there’s a truth to be dug from all of this. He comes to a halt, jerking a finger up in victory. “I think I’ve got it.”

Weary, she stares at him and fantasizes about putting some pants on and getting into her car. “This isn’t a case, Mulder,” she cautions. “I am not a mystery to be solved.”

“Of course not, Scully. I’m putting some pieces together, some patterns…” he winces. “And I see that this is an infinitesimal part of a much larger portrait you’ve been painting for years. That I must have ignored… because it was uncomfortable. Because I didn’t know what else to do. I’m sorry for that, Scully.” 

A light toss of her head to absolve him from guilt. Not your fault, she wants to say, but she also wants this conversation to end. The bed dips beside her and gravity pulls her rocking toward him, in spite of her will. “You need more than what I can do alone, but I do want you to feel comfortable with me. If you’re never comfortable anywhere else in your life, Scully, god, I want you to be comfortable with me. There’s nothing about you that I don’t… treasure. You’re the garden, I’m the octopus.” How could she not melt at that? And then the question, always the same question, kissed into her ear so gently: “Do you trust me, Scully?” as his arms snake around her waist.

One rule, heavy and real as concrete between them: if you say stop, I stop. The word weighs on her tongue when the silk brushes over her face, pushes at her lips when he ties the knot behind her head. The world fades to black, but she doesn’t forget that he’s with her or where she’s at.

At first she doesn’t like it. She can’t see anything, but awareness trickles in the darkest corners of her mind: awareness of her weight, of her thighs pressing together. He strips her of his shirt, peeling away the comforting scent of his cologne.

First, his hands cup her face. And she reminds herself: this is okay. He strokes her cheeks with his thumb, following the pattern of her blush as it spreads over her chest. From her cheek to her jaw, from her jaw to her neck. Every step of the way. This is okay. This is okay. Even when she really doesn’t feel okay, she tells herself: this is okay. Eventually she’s convinced, lets her tongue wet her lips in wordless pleasure as his thumbs dug into the knots in her shoulder blades.

“Is this okay?” He murmurs, his voice like an landmark. This is okay, she tells him. From her neck down the slope of her shoulders, and the curve of his path reminds her she is elegant, the right shape for her. The size of his hands make her feel safe. 

But they hadn’t gotten to the hard part, yet. When his fingers skim over her ribs, slip down her belly, clutch at her waist, and press into her hips, she wants to be swallowed up by the earth.

“Easy,” he whispers, kneading her gently. The blindfold is damp, her eyes wide open as she glares into nothingness. Stop.  _Stop._  But she can’t bring herself to fail him like that. An ugly sob claws at her throat when he glides from her pelvis (where she will always be empty) to her thighs (which she has never liked) and bursts from her, stormy and hoarse, when he says, completely on accident, just because he can’t help himself: “I fucking love your body so much, Scully.” It’s the first thing of that nature she’s ever heard from him, and she knows that’s because he’s just as scared as she is. “I love  _you.”_

He kisses every inch of her, from the crown of her head, to her kneecaps, every finger, her toes, the hollow spaces of her hip bones, and for the hour she feels fine. It won’t be enough to last a lifetime or even until the morning: she holds so much hate for what she thinks she lacks. Maybe, however, maybe there is a way to think differently. Mulder has always been good at showing her that. 


End file.
